Korea's money supply jumps 0.8% in December, up for 7th-straight month

Cash transport personnel at the Bank of Korea's headquarters in Jung District, central Seoul, are busy preparing to distribute funds for the Lunar New Year holiday to commercial banks on Feb. 5. [YONHAP]

Korea's money supply grew for the seventh-consecutive month in December despite ongoing efforts to implement tighter monetary policies, according to data released by the central bank on Friday.

The country's M2, a key gauge of the money supply, stood at 3,925.4 trillion won ($2.95 trillion) in December, up 0.8 percent from a month earlier, according to preliminary Bank of Korea (BOK) data.

The M2 is a money supply measure that counts cash, demand deposits and other easily convertible financial instruments.

The central bank has been tightening Korea's monetary policy, delivering seven consecutive hikes in borrowing costs from April 2022 to January 2023 to tame soaring inflation in Asia's fourth-largest economy.

Last month, the BOK held its key interest rate steady at 3.5 percent for the eighth-straight time amid a slowdown in growth and moderating inflation.

BY SEO JI-EUN, YONHAP [seo.jieun1@joongang.co.kr]